Awaken
by melmzzz
Summary: Ronan hasn't been able to sleep since it happened. And no sleep meant no dreams either. But can he really avoid facing his guilt forever?


Ronan hadn't been able to sleep since that night. Part of it was what he had seen. It had been so horrible, watching the flames burst and bloom around Kavinsky's chest. He had never wanted him to die. He had only wanted to keep Matthew safe. He rolled over in his bed, stretching a pale hand out across the pillow. He could hear Chainsaw's soft breaths, and occasionally, the ruffle of her feathers. She was asleep.

"Come out Noah," Ronan sighed. "You know, sometimes you're really fucking creepy." He didn't even have to look up, but he saw the movement out of the corner of his eye. Noah shimmered to life. Or, you know, as close to life as he could get.

"Do you miss him?" Noah's voice was soft, not accusatory. Ronan sat up, resting his elbows on his knees and burying his face in his hands. The hands that had stolen from dreams. He let out a noise that was somewhere between a growl and a frustrated grunt. If anyone, anyone else had asked him the question, he would have responded with one of his signature stares. The kind that made people regret even thinking the question. But Noah? Could he tell Noah what was tearing at the flesh inside him?

He didn't need to respond. Noah would just know. "I could have saved him, man. I was so fucking mad at him but I could've- fuck." Ronan felt the bed dip with Noah's weight.

He lifted his head from his hands, but Noah's back was turned. He was semi-transparent in the moonlight, and Ronan wondered for a brief moment how he had ever thought of him as anything but 'dead'.

They were silent for a long moment, the truth of Ronan's unspoken words hanging in the cool air. _I could have stopped him._

But he didn't. Because he had thought Kavinsky didn't matter.

"He chose to do it." Noah's voice was a whisper, but somehow less. Maybe it was the type of thing only dead people could do.

_Because I abandoned him. _When Ronan looked up again, Noah was gone. "Bastard." He'd get used to it someday, but for now, it still annoyed the shit out of him.

He lay back on his bed, fingers absentmindedly playing with the leather bands on his wrist. He had switched out the originals for Kavinsky's copies. He didn't know why, well he _did _know why, he just wouldn't ever admit it out loud or even to himself. He knotted them so that they were only just too tight, and if he were to remove them now there would be three angry, red bruises on his wrist. But he liked the pain. He deserved it. He closed his eyes.

All the warning signs had been there. Kavinsky had been obsessed. He had left these little gifts at the foot of the stairs, like a cat trying to impress his master by dragging in dead mice.

And Ronan had gone to him. He had wrecked the Pig and didn't think twice about going to Kavinsky. Dreaming was what got him into that mess. If he hadn't dreamed those keys, or the Night Terror, if Kavinsky hadn't been able to pull things from dreams too, maybe he would have been better off. Maybe he would have learned to cope better in the real world. Maybe he wouldn't be dead. Maybe Ronan wouldn't have used him.

He used him. The realization felt sick and twisted in his gut. He wanted to claw the feeling out of him, but he knew it was true. He had used him to fix his own selfish problems and then he had left him. He let him believe there could be something, at least a friendship there, and then he sped off in his prize. Had he really expected Kavinsky to just accept it? To just be used and cast aside and do nothing about it?

Ronan opened his eyes again and realized he wasn't in his room anymore. He hadn't even noticed himself slipping into the dream, it had been seamless.

He was in the forest. He hadn't been here since the night Kavinsky died. Everything felt different. It felt dead, scorched. The Orphan Girl was gone. The trees were silent. Dread hung on their branches like something tangible, weighing them down, casting shadows over the forest floor like overextended fingers reaching for him, wanting to drag him down and bury him.

But something was here. A shiver rolled through his spine, raising goosebumps along the flesh in an eerily similar pattern. Memories of a finger trailing down his back in a drug-induced stupor pulled at the corners of his mind. Ronan wanted to turn, to make sure there was nothing there, but he was frozen in place. This was not his dream.

He felt a breath, soft at his ear, whispering something he couldn't understand. Ronan clamped his eyes shut, and he suddenly felt like the scared little boy again, watching his father being beaten to death.

_This isn't real. This isn't real. This isn't real._

"Oh Lynch, of course it's real."

Ronan's eyes snapped open.

Kavinsky was there, in front of him, leaning against a tree, shades hiding his eyes like always. He was wearing a white wifebeater, marred with soot and ash, and his jeans were slung low on his hips. He looked almost exactly like he had the night of the Fourth. Except, there was a grey cast about him, like the blood had been drained from his body. The smirk that played across his lips was contorted, and Ronan couldn't help but wince. He lifted a cigarette to his mouth and took a long drag, creating nearly an inch of ash that refused to fall.

"How's reality?" Ronan didn't respond. He just stared, his face carefully composed to show no emotion. He wanted nothing more than to wake up and leave this place, but he was also drawn to Kavinsky, and the inner turmoil kept him still and silent. Finally, when the cigarette was burned down to the nub, Kavinsky flicked it away, pushed off the tree, which Ronan now noticed was charred black and ashy where his skin had made contact, and strolled towards him.

He crossed his arms over his chest and it was only then that Ronan noticed the wisps of smoke wafting from his body.

"I'm so-," Ronan began. Kavinsky's laugh echoed through the forest, the trees shaking from the disturbed sound.

"You're what? You're sorry? Come on, Lynch. I thought we weren't going to lie to each other."

Kavinsky pushed his glasses up onto his head. His eyes were black, hollow pits. The irises looked too big and left only the barest amount of whites visible.

Ronan heard a rumble deep in the forest, and for a moment, his blank mask slipped, and he felt the fear show plainly on his face.

Kavinsky smirked, the corners of his lips twisting his mouth into an exaggerated smile, too big for his face. It didn't belong there. This wasn't the Kavinsky Ronan knew.

"Scared, Lynch? Because you should be. This time I _am_ the most dangerous thing in here." A screech reverberated in his ears, but the forest around him stayed stark still, and Ronan wondered if he was just remembering the last time he had been here. He took a step back, then another.

"It was never going to be-" Kavinsky's smile shifted so smoothly into a snarl that Ronan had to wonder if it wasn't that way all along, and he lunged. Ronan felt the searing fingers close around his neck. He smelled the burnt flesh and smoke and where their skin connected there were flames. Just as Kavinsky began to squeeze, Ronan saw the space around them shimmer and shift.

He was awake. But Kavinsky was still there.


End file.
